The Alternative Business History: Business in Emerging Markets

This article suggests that the business history of emerging markets should be seen as an alternative business history, rather than merely adding new settings to explore established core debates. The discipline of business history evolved around the corporate strategies and structures of developed economies. The growing literature on the business history of emerging markets addresses contexts that are different from those of developed markets. These regions had long eras of foreign domination, had extensive state intervention, faced institutional inefficiencies, and experienced extended turbulence. This article suggests that this context drove different business responses than are found in the developed world. Entrepreneurs counted more than managerial hierarchies; immigrants and diaspora were critical sources of entrepreneurship; illegal and informal forms of business were common; diversified business groups rather than the M-form became the major form of large-scale business; corporate strategies to deal with turbulence were essential; and radical corporate social-responsibility concepts were pursued by some firms

Co-evolution, opportunity seeking and institutional change: Entrepreneurship and the Indian telecommunications industry 1923-2009

"This is an Author's Original Manuscript of an article submitted for consideration in Business History [copyright Taylor & Francis]; Business History is available online at http://www.tandfonline.com/." 10.1080/00076791.2012.687538In this paper, we demonstrate the importance for entrepreneurship of historical contexts and processes, and the co-evolution of institutions, practices, discourses and cultural norms. Drawing on discourse and institutional theories, we develop a model of the entrepreneurial field, and apply this in analysing the rise to global prominence of the Indian telecommunications industry. We draw on entrepreneurial life histories to show how various discourses and discursive processes ultimately worked to generate change and the creation of new business opportunities. We propose that entrepreneurship involves more than individual acts of business creation, but also implies collective endeavours to shape the future direction of the entrepreneurial field